YouTube will finally ban Qanon and other conspiracy content that targets people

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Platforms like Facebook have already taken action against Qanon, and now YouTube is updating its policies to address potentially-harmful conspiracy theories from groups like Qanon.

According to a new blog post outlining the update, YouTube states, “Today, we are taking another step in our efforts to curb hate and harassment by removing more conspiracy theory content used to justify real-world violence.”

In the post, YouTube notes the challenges with constantly monitoring and flagging such content, as it is always evolving. The company says it has to continuously update policies and improve systems used to monitor and report such content on its platform, in an effort to stay ahead, but with how massive YouTube is, that can be challenging.

The blog outlines four main pillars that YouTube uses to address such content: removing violative content, reducing the spread of harmful misinformation, raising authoritative voices, and rewarding trusted creators.

It’s important to note that YouTube is not outright banning all Qanon content or other conspiracies, but that it will remove content that actual targets individuals or groups of people. That said, Qanon is basically a group that literally targets groups of people, by stating that high-profile celebrities and Democrats are eating/sacrificing children or something. It is also believed that Donald Trump is secretly fighting this group.

YouTube joins Facebook, Twitter, Etsy, and more in the removal of Qanon, which the FBI classified in 2019 as a potential domestic terrorist group.

What do you think? Glad to see YouTube doing this? Let us know down below in the comments or carry the discussion over to our Twitter or Facebook.

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Josiah Motley

Former KnowTechie editor.